Your Character's Name: Virgil Bates I could have said so many things. I could have asked them to put away their weapons because the trip they would experience would be so intense that they would no doubt attack all manner of hallucinogenic foes. I could have stalled the chemist as he looked closely at my compound, insulting him, exclaimed he was jealous of my skills, which I would then add, were furious. Instead I stood silent as a filthy Horseman stabbed me with a syringe full of deadly poison made by my own hand.
My shoulder feels fine, the syringe hardly hurt at all. A small red dot is the only evidence of violence. My hand has been burned though, and I have not yet bandaged it. Red and cracked, it burns raw in the cool breeze. I offered two men drugs designed to kill them. I am bothered by how I botched the plan, not by premeditated murder. I wonder if I have killed any man in a fair fight, or if my body count is entirely comprised of the harmless and unknowing.If I believed in any kind of higher power I would be worried.
Dad had not been a religious man, quite the opposite. On the grounds he would go to church with the rest of the family but when we hunted together he showed me a rock he had found. It’s words had convinced him that if God was not dead, He might as well be. I became enamored with philosophy and books at that point I think, to find something like the stone for my dad, only instead making him atheist, it would make him notice me. I got kicked out not long after that day. The firstborn son of the third richest family and all I inherited was a water bottle and a rifle. I've blamed God and the rock in time.
All the horsemen dead, Ursa reappeared. She left to investigate screams while Merc struggled to contain his own. After finding their source she had medicated the man to stop his agony. Commendable. But when he regained consciousness Ursa refused to help him, Phil maybe? The man she had just saved. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I was on the verge of tears a minute earlier, touched my friends had come back for me, but this? The cripple was ungrateful, to be sure, but leaving a one legged man out here alone is the same as a death sentence. The bear seemed to show as much compassion for mankind as the rest of us. And I had just seen it bite a man’s head off.
Father had told me my scientific studies were a waste. After the fight I was ready to agree with him. A computer in the room removed all doubt of this fact, leaving me perpetually in the wrong. I had hoped for Oregon Trail or Math Blasters booting it up but it was empty of anything remotely interesting. The kid wrote down some code on it, saving it to a flash drive. He proceeded to hide said flash drive and lie about it. Like my own father I reminded the child that liars go to hell. Should I have spanked him? After all we did for him he has the audacity to defy us? I have his precious flash drive now, but have half a mind to chuck it in a lake first chance I get. And pop the brat’s balloon, and take back MY bike. I apparently killed a man for it, finder’s keepers.
In my pocket jangles a dog collar I found on a pile of corpses that Ursa had eyed hungrily. The collar read ‘Rufus’. What a good name, I could imagine him in life, tail wagging, ears askew, tongue lolling. I had occupied my time in this imagining manner before meeting my now companions. How had I known how to make Rundown? Sure I know about chemistry, but to know a specific chemical formula, I had to have made it before. Am I a drug addict? I couldn’t see myself taking Rundown, but Nostalgia? A few hits of that and Rufus would be bounding along beside me in a flowering field under a clear blue sky. My wife probably left me because I spent everything on drugs, if I find her she’ll want nothing to do with me.
I remember sitting around a crackling fire in a thunderstorm. Brewnuar was explaining his complex pagan pantheon and arguing with Grokkthrakk’s beliefs, which focused on nature and prophecy. I remember Grokkthrakk had several shaman advisors when we dethroned him. I put forth my belief in a mechanical universe, that free will was an illusion, all the atoms making up our brains and stimuli caused our reactions and given the same environment each individual would act the same way infinite times. V.R. coldly asked me if I believed that what the point of doing anything was? Victor saved my life by starting to drone on about how it didn’t matter if there was a destiny or not. I was quick to point out the fact that Nihilism isn’t really a religion, to which he cackled that he did not care.
I don’t know why I have threatened two people in the last three days with hell when I myself do not believe in it. I want justice, I want a plan, I hate seeing us move from place to place killing or ignoring everyone we encounter. Mercury saved me, but I am only a tool in his eyes. He said that there might be a record of my wife at the hospital he wants us to go besiege. I may be old, addled, and naive, but I am not an idiot. If there is a God is watching what I do, does he do so with an understanding heart? Or could it be that He is actively punishing me for the life I cannot remember, the sins I consistently commit? I feel from the bottom of my sou-
God Damnit! I forgot my kaleidoscope in that mall didn’t I?!? Fiddle-Sticks! Falderall! We have to go back!
I could have said so many things. I could have asked them to put away their weapons because the trip they would experience would be so intense that they would no doubt attack all manner of hallucinogenic foes. I could have stalled the chemist as he looked closely at my compound, insulting him, exclaimed he was jealous of my skills, which I would then add, were furious. Instead I stood silent as a filthy Horseman stabbed me with a syringe full of deadly poison made by my own hand.
My shoulder feels fine, the syringe hardly hurt at all. A small red dot is the only evidence of violence. My hand has been burned though, and I have not yet bandaged it. Red and cracked, it burns raw in the cool breeze. I offered two men drugs designed to kill them. I am bothered by how I botched the plan, not by premeditated murder. I wonder if I have killed any man in a fair fight, or if my body count is entirely comprised of the harmless and unknowing.If I believed in any kind of higher power I would be worried.
Dad had not been a religious man, quite the opposite. On the grounds he would go to church with the rest of the family but when we hunted together he showed me a rock he had found. It’s words had convinced him that if God was not dead, He might as well be. I became enamored with philosophy and books at that point I think, to find something like the stone for my dad, only instead making him atheist, it would make him notice me. I got kicked out not long after that day. The firstborn son of the third richest family and all I inherited was a water bottle and a rifle. I've blamed God and the rock in time.
All the horsemen dead, Ursa reappeared. She left to investigate screams while Merc struggled to contain his own. After finding their source she had medicated the man to stop his agony. Commendable. But when he regained consciousness Ursa refused to help him, Phil maybe? The man she had just saved. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I was on the verge of tears a minute earlier, touched my friends had come back for me, but this? The cripple was ungrateful, to be sure, but leaving a one legged man out here alone is the same as a death sentence. The bear seemed to show as much compassion for mankind as the rest of us. And I had just seen it bite a man’s head off.
Father had told me my scientific studies were a waste. After the fight I was ready to agree with him. A computer in the room removed all doubt of this fact, leaving me perpetually in the wrong. I had hoped for Oregon Trail or Math Blasters booting it up but it was empty of anything remotely interesting. The kid wrote down some code on it, saving it to a flash drive. He proceeded to hide said flash drive and lie about it. Like my own father I reminded the child that liars go to hell. Should I have spanked him? After all we did for him he has the audacity to defy us? I have his precious flash drive now, but have half a mind to chuck it in a lake first chance I get. And pop the brat’s balloon, and take back MY bike. I apparently killed a man for it, finder’s keepers.
In my pocket jangles a dog collar I found on a pile of corpses that Ursa had eyed hungrily. The collar read ‘Rufus’. What a good name, I could imagine him in life, tail wagging, ears askew, tongue lolling. I had occupied my time in this imagining manner before meeting my now companions. How had I known how to make Rundown? Sure I know about chemistry, but to know a specific chemical formula, I had to have made it before. Am I a drug addict? I couldn’t see myself taking Rundown, but Nostalgia? A few hits of that and Rufus would be bounding along beside me in a flowering field under a clear blue sky. My wife probably left me because I spent everything on drugs, if I find her she’ll want nothing to do with me.
I remember sitting around a crackling fire in a thunderstorm. Brewnuar was explaining his complex pagan pantheon and arguing with Grokkthrakk’s beliefs, which focused on nature and prophecy. I remember Grokkthrakk had several shaman advisors when we dethroned him. I put forth my belief in a mechanical universe, that free will was an illusion, all the atoms making up our brains and stimuli caused our reactions and given the same environment each individual would act the same way infinite times. V.R. coldly asked me if I believed that what the point of doing anything was? Victor saved my life by starting to drone on about how it didn’t matter if there was a destiny or not. I was quick to point out the fact that Nihilism isn’t really a religion, to which he cackled that he did not care.
I don’t know why I have threatened two people in the last three days with hell when I myself do not believe in it. I want justice, I want a plan, I hate seeing us move from place to place killing or ignoring everyone we encounter. Mercury saved me, but I am only a tool in his eyes. He said that there might be a record of my wife at the hospital he wants us to go besiege. I may be old, addled, and naive, but I am not an idiot. If there is a God is watching what I do, does he do so with an understanding heart? Or could it be that He is actively punishing me for the life I cannot remember, the sins I consistently commit? I feel from the bottom of my sou-
God Damnit! I forgot my kaleidoscope in that mall didn’t I?!?
Fiddle-Sticks! Falderall! We have to go back!